I'm watching the HD re-scan of the series and at about 7m:30s you can see Seth Green-- sitting what would have been just out of frame beside Buffy-- smiling and nodding his head like we was getting into the cheerleaders. It completely broke character and contradicted his explicitly stated nonplussed response earlier, and it was hi-LAR-ious.
--Just finished it. I have to agree with Andrew, below. This is exactly the episode I would show someone as an example of the show's value. It almost plays out like a standalone film. Although, whereas I found Xander's and Cordelia's individual stereotype character dialog rather perfunctory here, this episode gave Sarah Michelle Gellar the chance to display some rather delightful and uncommon moments of elation and glee, along with some explosively delivered lines of the kind that she doesn't normally get-- both to great comedic effect --along with new dramatically challenging Olympics that she always seems to execute with effortless aplomb.
First time actually seeing this because I missed it airing after being canceled originally, and just never got around to it. Definitely not sure it was worth the wait.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2018-11-17T16:22:24Z
[8.8/10] Outstanding episode. This is a great example of the show balancing the “high school as horror” conceit with Buffy wishing she could know what her boyfriend was thinking and then getting the ability to read minds. It goes for both comedy, with the thoughts of Xander, Cordy, Oz, and even Wesley, for action, when Angel and Buffy fight the demons, for drama, when the Scoobies have to race to find the killer, for pathos, when Jonathan admits his pain, and for character growth and understanding, when Buffy realizes how much everyone is in pain.
There’s also a brilliant escalation with Buffy’s powers, going from a neat thing to a curse very quickly. And the way she goes from wanting to understand others’ thoughts to being desperate to block them out is the perfect “be careful what you wish for.” All along the way, there’s brilliant fakeouts and red herrings, from the sardonic newspaper editor just avoiding hassle for his bad review of Oz’s band, to the lunch lady being the ultimate culprit. And the dialogue, as always, is winning and hilarious, with Cordelia’s concern for the cheerleaders being the peak. This show was pitching its fastball right now, mastering shifts in story and tone and conversation so expertly it’s amazing.
Overall, this is one of those episodes that I would show to somebody to explain what this series is capable of.